Wednesday, January 31, 2018

Resident Insurance Tracking: Peace of Mind for Your Building

In this issue, we introduce you to our powerful, new resident insurance information module. Though we only released it a few months ago, users have already uploaded over 10,000 policy records! Now, we’re going public with how it works, what problems it can solve for you, and how to use its new automated email feature that we know you’ll love. Plus, a taste of the activity we're already seeing!

Resident Insurance Tracking

Are you excited about your current process for handling resident insurance policy info and compliance communications? Maybe not.

Tracking insurance policy hard copies, figuring out which units are covered, and staying on top of upcoming expiration dates can be a big time-sink.

Nevertheless, your building’s insurance information obviously must be kept current—disasters big and small can strike at any time. When a leak in 4B floods three other apartments, will you be digging through an overflowing filing cabinet, filled with paperwork, only to find that 4B’s policy expired months ago?

The Big Picture

Our new Resident Insurance module keeps your residents’ insurance info online, up-to-date, and easily accessible. It’s designed to highlight and help you quickly deal with expiring policies. It also lets your residents input their insurance info themselves - which means your staff will not be doing all of the manual data-entry.

Ready to hear how this new module can work for you? We’ve broken it down into five sections:

Entering Your Existing Insurance Policy Information

Gather up your existing spreadsheets, notes, and scanned-in or physical copies of resident insurance policies, and put it all into BuildingLink! You can enter policy start and end dates, carrier and agent info, and coverage details and limits. Upload hardcopies of the actual policies, or certificates of insurance. Once it’s in BuildingLink, your data can be displayed, sorted, searched, filtered, and updated - plus, individual policies can be retrieved as needed.

The convenient Insurance Visualization dashboard displays your building’s complete insurance picture at a glance: (1) what percentage of residents are in compliance, (2) which units have coverage, (3) how many policies have expired, (4) what the range of coverage limits area, and (5) who has been ignoring the automated reminders they have received. The dashboard also provides graphs showing which insurance providers your residents are choosing, so you can see trends or make suggestions to residents who have not yet purchased insurance.

Does your building require insurance? How much coverage do residents need to have? Save yourself from repeatedly having to answer these and other resident questions by setting and posting your building’s exact coverage requirements to BuildingLink. Every building is different, so we put the power in your hands: under “Insurance Settings,” you can communicate whether homeowners and/or renters insurance is required, and specify the minimum coverage amounts for both Personal Liability and Personal Property/Contents. Your residents will appreciate knowing the details, and getting it right the first time!

Collecting the Insurance Information You Don’t Yet Have—the Easy Way!

Okay, you’ve set your building’s insurance requirements, but you have never collected this info from your residents. So, how are you going to get started? Do you need to chase down all your residents to get the policy information you are missing?

Answer: NO.

Let BuildingLink Automation help. We provide you with 5 different automated emails that you can customize for different insurance situations - each of which leads your residents to submit their information into the Resident Insurance database. With one click, you can email all of your residents who are missing coverage information, reach out before a new tenant moves in, or when a policy is about to expire. Your automated messages go out to only the relevant residents, with wording that you’ve customized to suit your needs.

Connecting Residents with Insurance Providers

Shopping for insurance can be a hassle. We’ve helped make life easier for those residents who don’t have insurance and want it, by providing links to some of the leading insurance companies inside the BuildingLink platform.

Plus, via a special relationship with Lemonade, residents in certain states can even purchase a policy entirely online, without having to speak to a human! (Apparently, millennials like this sort of thing.) Another thing millennials- and everyone- will love: thanks to our powerful API, Lemonade users can have their insurance details automatically go straight from Lemonade into your BuildingLink dashboard.

Keeping Policies Current

Getting your residents’ insurance policy information is only the beginning of how we can help. You’ve got to keep that info current, but you don’t want to spend all your time chasing after your residents to maintain your records. That’s where email automation is your friend: just set an automated message to go out whenever a resident’s policy is approaching its expiration date, and they’ll receive an email reminding them to updatetheir policy and info. (And, recording a policy renewal is a snap for you and your residents; there’s no need to reenter all of a unit’s insurance information from scratch.)

Want more information on Resident Insurance Tracking? Check out this help page for complete details and instructions, or call our awesome Support team and get the personalized service you need!

Love Automation? There’s More on the Way!

Automated emails are one your most powerful tools for creating a robust communications system for your building – a tool that gets your message out when and how you want, freeing you up to do other things. This feature in the resident insurance information module is our first attempt at shifting a task that building managers spent a lot of time doing manually over to residents. Let our automated email system free up you and your staff to focus on more vital matters. What else could you do with more free time, thanks to automated systems? You’re about to find out, as more automated communications systems are on their way!

How Are People Using This Module?

Since launching the Resident Insurance Compliance Module, managers and residents have created over 10,000 profiles! That number grows every day as more and more communities discover how powerful and useful it is. To wrap up this info-packed missive, here are two fun facts that we’re already seeing about the ways residents and managers are using it.

1. Who’s Inputting the Data?

One of this module’s most powerful features is the ability for anyone - resident or manager - to enter insurance data. So, who’s actually sitting down and doing the work? Overwhelmingly the answer is : the staff, but residents will do it. Check out this chart:

2. Are Policy Copies Being Uploaded?

Adding PDF of insurance forms is one of the most useful things you can do with this module. But, are people taking advantage of it? Yes! Overall, almost twice as many entries have attachments with them vs those that don’t: